August – Week 2 Summary

13Aug

August 8, 2011

For a while it was up in the air, airport full body scanners, is the radiation they produce hazardous? Well, it looks like an answer may finally be revealing itself, sadly. The rate of cancer amongst TSA Security Agents has risen in the presence of the full-body scanners. While this doesn’t necessarily show a solid connection between the two, there is something that does. The EPIC, via a FOIA lawsuit, has acquired radiation studies and radiation test results from the Department of Homeland Security that reveal that the government didn’t do their due diligence in testing for safety and disregarded concerns brought forth by airports. TSA union reps are seriously pissed off, feeling that they had been misled in regards to the safety of these machines. I may not particularly care for the TSA, and I feel that some of the agents abuse their powers over travelers, but nobody deserves this. I’m sure the agency will find some way to get out of covering costs associated with their cancer treatments also. Think about this, why did the EPIC have to sue to gain access to this obviously crucial information? Add this little tid-bit onto that, the former secretary of the Dept. of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff, after leaving in 2009, formed the Chertoff Group, a security consulting company. The Chertoff Group, (as well as many full-body scanner manufacturers) are known lobbyists, coincidentally his company eventually sold 150 full-body scanners to the TSA. I wonder if there’s some sort of connection. (Full story on ActivistPost)

I’m sorry, but does anyone actually think Republican Presidential Candidate Michelle Bachmann is intelligent. She’s like Sarah Palin 2.0, only this upgrade is like going from Windows Millenium to Vista. Michelle has pledged to lock the doors and turn off the lights on the EPA. Look, I understand Republicans love to treat the EPA like their favorite scapegoat when it comes to talks about job creation. Their illogical thinking puts the EPA at risk of future destruction, followed shortly by the environment and our health. They think that the stringent restrictions put in place by the EPA to protect our health are based on junk science (i.e. anything not in the Bible) and are thus unnecessary and do nothing but cost corporations great deals of money following them. This in turn leads to them being unable to hire additional workers or causes them to leave the country in search of nations with more lax environmental laws. At least, that’s what they’ll tell you, the reality is more likely much more disturbing. How about, these corporations find following these regulations a pain and do nothing but cut into their profits, and since they’ve bought and paid for our government are working their hardest to convince us all that they’re actually preventing the creation of jobs. I’m sorry, Michelle, but you’re just a basic idiot. (Full story on Grist)

Random Quote

"They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying to get what they want … Well, we know what they want. They want more for themselves and less for everybody else... Good honest hard-working people continue to elect these rich cocksuckers who don’t give a fuck about you..." - George Carlin

Random Quote

"If you want to see the true measure of a man, watch how he treats his inferiors, not his equals." -J.K. Rowling

Random Quote

"Every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies...A theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed." - Dwight D. Eisenhower